Improving High School STEM Education in Physics

Abstract

This project will provide astate-of-the-art STEM Physics program, including lab equipment, to 45physics classrooms in eight districts high schools in Navy-impactedcommunities across Virginia,involving 7,000 students and their teachers. This three-year project is afollow-up to the ongoing, successful STEM Physics program (funded by theONR) in 36 high schools in Rhode Island during 2015-2017. Physics,chemistry, and algebra are ???gatekeeper??? courses to technical careers in anyengineering or technology discipline. We must increase achievement,participation, and teacher quality in these courses if we want more studentsto choose STEM careers. The current project will provide neededinstructional resources and teacher training. This multi-pronged approachhas seen success through past work with Physics, A First Course (2006), ANatural Approach to Chemistry (2009) and recent work with the ONR-fundedEssential Physics program (2015-2017). The proposed project will provide1,104 textbooks, 2,446 electronic books, and 270 class sets of advancedsensors and chemistry apparatus, into 45 classrooms in the high schools incommunities of significance to the Navy in nine school districts incommunities initially in and around southeastern Virginia including VirginiaBeach, Suffolk, Norfolk, Chesapeake, and Newport News. The new 3rd editionof Essential Physics will be used to support teachers and students. Itincludes both a textbook and interactive e-Book. In this project EssentialPhysics will be used to support Virginia SOL-based lessons. The project willbe administered by the Old Dominion University Research Foundation. Projectactivities will be evaluated by Old Dominion University Center forEducational Partnerships.

Document Details

Document Type
DoD Grant Award
Publication Date
Sep 04, 2018
Source ID
N000141812804

Entities

People

  • Joanna Garner

Organizations

  • Office of Naval Research
  • Old Dominion University
  • United States Navy

Tags

Fields of Study

  • Education
  • Physics

Readers

  • Neurological Diseases/Conditions/Disorders
  • Research Science/Academic Research
  • STEM Education

Technology Areas

  • Microelectronics